As I write and post this article I am leaving a carbon footprint.
How many funny/informative/good news/bad news videos do you watch online every day?
We all use electronic devices a lot. But how often do you think about your personal use and the impact of your electronic devices?
Let’s dig in!
💻 Your electronic devices: computers & smartphones 📱
-The carbon footprint of making & shipping a standard laptop is around 300 kg of CO2 equivalent (this excludes the high-end & gaming models)
-The carbon output of manufacturing a smartphone is around 55kg of CO2 equivalent
-Each of these also uses 10+ of the Earth’s precious metals and rare minerals
👣 Carbon footprint per year
-There is varying data online and it totally depends on what you use each device for
-Back in 2018 (this is old data so it will be much more today), Statista published carbon output figures for electronic devices, where a laptop was estimated to produce 85 kg CO2 and a smartphone only around 8 kg of CO2 per year
-But what if you watched videos on your phone (using 4G) every day totalling to 1 hour? That would already jump the carbon output to 30 kg of CO2 per year…
📊 Data
Let’s have a look at data of your electronic devices.
-To browse 1 GB of data (managed by large data centres) = around 5 hours of web browsing = driving a car a couple of hundred metres
😵 Problems!
But actually it is very hard to calculate how much energy 1 GB of data uses, because there are so many varying factors involved.
1 GB of data:
-Downloaded v streamed v stored v browsed – streamed uses the most energy – so the car will go further! – Nearing 1 km for 1 GB of streaming
-What device are you using?
-What is its make?
-How is the data centre where the GB is going through set-up?
-Where does the centre get its energy from? Fossil fuels, renewables…
-When was the device made? Each year the energy consumption for 1 GB will increase as devices become more powerful
👌Digital usage advice!
-Put your electronic devices on Wi-Fi rather than 4G
-Download videos rather than stream
-If there is a text version available, read it rather than watching the video! Or listen to an audio version
-Our pal AI is great. But do you really need to use it for everything that you do? Limit its use!
-If you can share a document you don’t need to email it as an attachment
-You don’t need to save everything on the cloud, some stuff can be saved on your computer
-Close apps/sites when you’re not on them and switch off your laptop rather than keeping it on standby
-Watch the amount of time you spend aimless/endless browsing!
-If it’s not broken, keep it! Does your phone still work after 3 years? Great!
-When you buy a new device, have a look at refurbished options. Electronic components are hard to recycle and often end up as toxic waste. So reusing parts to create a new device is a much better option
-Organise some time for your own digital clean-ups. Delete old data! In France such an initiative started several years ago where a digital cleanup week is held every year in March. They also host digital challenges that you can participate in (or you can do your own in your own time)
P.s. This article only focused on two devices. There are a lot more electronics in our house. Some of these don’t even have an off button. Our TV, for example, has a power button but it only switches the TV on or puts it on standby. Unplugging is the only way…
Sources: Le Monde, Circular Computing, Statista, Greenly, Reboxed, Dev on a Journey, 8 Billion Trees, Everphone, Digital Cleanup
…And if you want to read more about what I do in the climate space, then please do check out my services.